Token effect beliefs, stigma consciousness and the organizational attractiveness of homogeneous firms among women employees

Purpose The paper aims to investigate how diversity recruitment advertisements affect women’s token effect beliefs and attraction to an organization based on their level of stigma consciousness. Design/methodology/approach Using online surveys, 136 women participants were randomly assigned to view one of two fictitious job ads portraying different degrees of gender diversity. Participants were surveyed on the organizational attractiveness of the fictitious company, their stigma consciousness, token effect beliefs and basic demographic information. A moderated mediation model using path analysis in Mplus v.8 was used to examine the effect of diversity emphasis, stigma consciousness and token effect beliefs on organizational attractiveness. Findings Results suggest that women with high stigma consciousness believe they will experience stronger token effects at organizations with a male-majority emphasis in recruitment ad compared to low stigma-conscious women. Further, as an underlying mechanism implied by signaling theory, token effect beliefs mediate the relationship between diversity recruitment ads and organizational attractiveness based on subjects’ level of stigma consciousness. Originality/value The current study highlights how token effect beliefs and stigma consciousness drive individual differences in how women job seekers are attracted to organizations. Moreover, our study reveals how the attitudes of women job seekers towards diversity recruitment ads differ, suggesting that researchers should depart from the monolithic view of women’s perspectives regarding workplace diversity research.